From Berlin to Berkeley is an intellectual portrait of one of America's leading social scientists, Reinhard Bendix, and his father, Ludwig Bendix. It is a story of cultural identity and assimilation, of survivors from a course of events that destroyed millions of lives.
Reinhard Bendix offers a profound and moving account of his father's life as a lawyer and critic of the German judicial system, his break with Judaism and identification with German culture, and his emigration to Palestine during Hitler's regime. Bendix then examines the relationship with his father and details his youth in Germany, his emigration to America, and his early career as a scholar.
Covering the period from 1877 to the present, Bendix shows how the two lives were touched by the culture of Imperial Germany, the German legal profession, World War I, the revolution of November 1918 in Germany and subsequent inflation, the Great Depression of the 1930s and the crisis of the Weimar Republic, the Hitler regime, emigration to Palestine and the United States, World War II, the division of Germany, and the world-political role of the United States. The book is a significant measure of one family and one civilization that has shaped our experiences throughout this tragic century.
"In From Berlin to Berkeley, a book written from the heart, Bendix provides us with an example of objective personal growth and intellectual integrity and with a remarkable illustration of a relationship between ideas and biography."
--Arthur J. Vidich, American Journal of Sociology
"An enlightening and moving piece of writing."
--Lewis A. Coser, Contemporary Sociology
"Bendix is a distinguished academic, noted for his contributions to political sociology. In this splendid book, he turns his attention to his own intellectual and emotional genesis, drawing a portrait of his father and of himself. A self-conscious and moving exploration that melds sociological case study, autobiography, and family history."
--N. B. Rosenthal, Choice
"From Berlin to Berkeley is a most compelling, revealing, and important document. It speaks to many concerns . . . in trying to wrestle with themes in a new sociology of exile: alienation in its literal and psychiatric sense, loneliness, marginality, and the paradox of being in a state of permanent instability."
--Peter I. Rose, Smith College
"In From Berlin to Berkeley, a book written from the heart, Bendix provides us with an example of objective personal growth and intellectual integrity and with a remarkable illustration of a relationship between ideas and biography."
--Arthur J. Vidich, American Journal of Sociology
"An enlightening and moving piece of writing."
--Lewis A. Coser, Contemporary Sociology
"Bendix is a distinguished academic, noted for his contributions to political sociology. In this splendid book, he turns his attention to his own intellectual and emotional genesis, drawing a portrait of his father and of himself. A self-conscious and moving exploration that melds sociological case study, autobiography, and family history."
--N. B. Rosenthal, Choice
"From Berlin to Berkeley is a most compelling, revealing, and important document. It speaks to many concerns . . . in trying to wrestle with themes in a new sociology of exile: alienation in its literal and psychiatric sense, loneliness, marginality, and the paradox of being in a state of permanent instability."
--Peter I. Rose, Smith College
-In From Berlin to Berkeley, a book written from the heart, Bendix provides us with an example of objective personal growth and intellectual integrity and with a remarkable illustration of a relationship between ideas and biography.-
--Arthur J. Vidich, American Journal of Sociology
-An enlightening and moving piece of writing.-
--Lewis A. Coser, Contemporary Sociology
-Bendix is a distinguished academic, noted for his contributions to political sociology. In this splendid book, he turns his attention to his own intellectual and emotional genesis, drawing a portrait of his father and of himself. A self-conscious and moving exploration that melds sociological case study, autobiography, and family history.-
--N. B. Rosenthal, Choice
-From Berlin to Berkeley is a most compelling, revealing, and important document. It speaks to many concerns . . . in trying to wrestle with themes in a new sociology of exile: alienation in its literal and psychiatric sense, loneliness, marginality, and the paradox of being in a state of permanent instability.-
--Peter I. Rose, Smith College
